Any remaining doubts that 2021 was a tough year for the claimant sector were washed away this week after the government published its latest injury claims data.
Following a Freedom of Information request by the Association of Consumer Support Organisations (ACSO) the Compensation Recovery Unit received almost 100,000 fewer motor injury claims in 2021 than the previous year.
From the pre-pandemic mark of 653,893 claims in 2019, the incidence of injury claims has plummeted by a quarter of a million since, a drop of just under 40 per cent in three years. An astonishing reduction by any measure.
The good news is that fewer people were injured on our roads, and it's all down to the impact of the pandemic.
The Department for Transport said in its latest traffic update that collectively, just under 300 billion vehicle miles were completed in Great Britain between September 2020 and September 2021. While motor vehicle traffic was broadly stable compared to the year ending September 2020 (+0.4 per cent), it was 16 per cent lower than pre-pandemic levels, as seen in the year ending December 2019.
So, fewer miles means fewer accidents and fewer injuries, with additional environmental benefits from reduced emissions. In this case, the statistics don't lie.
In his/her latest book, Fake Law, the Secret Barrister takes the government to task for sponsoring the 2019 (p.91- 93) on a false premise.
The author argues that the ministers were taken in by a raft of unsubstantiated data and dodgy assertions about the extent of whiplash injuries in the UK, which ultimately led to the Civil Liability Act, a law that financially penalised genuinely injured people and curtailed their ability to gain access to justice.
The government said it wanted to reduce the incidence of unmeritorious claims, a noble intention, but the Secret Barrister asks: "Who is really benefitting here?", concluding that the clear and obvious beneficiaries are the insurance companies.
Sure enough, and although fewer inured people on our roads last year is a clear social good, if we ask the same question about the financial beneficiaries of the fall in claims as the Secret Barrister we get the same answer.
Fewer accidents means fewer claims on insurance policies, and 100,000 fewer injuries adds up to a lot of windfall savings for insurance companies.
ACSO commissioned Pragmatix Advisory to investigate the savings made by insurers from the pandemic and the findings, which were published in October 2021, were extraordinary.
Pragmatix found that insurers made excess profits of £3.3billion from the pandemic as a result of fewer accidents. Yet this huge saving was not mirrored by a reduction in motor premiums.
Average car insurance costs fell by just £25 over the course of 18 months; if the entire £3.3billion had been handed back to customers they would have received a reduction of £118 each.
Of all the motor insurers, only Admiral said it would compensate customers for the pandemic, and then only by £25 per premium.
As ACSO noted at the time, "if insurers are keen to trumpet the £25 drop in premiums during the past 18 months, it's worth asking why they have kept quiet about the further £93 per policy in unexpected profits, for which they have had to do nothing."
The costs of the pandemic are eye-watering, and in time those bills will have to be paid. Moreover, inflationary pressures in the economy have significantly increased the cost of living, with most families worried about paying for basics like food and energy - and insurance.
There are also serious questions being asked about businesses which capitalised on the pandemic. They include businesses that short circuited the usual procedural routes to land big supply contracts for PPE (personal protective equipment).
A wide variety of businesses also successfully applied for government loans to see them through the crisis. Last week the government announced that it would not be pursuing more than £4billion of fraudulently retained covid cash that it handed out to applicants in 2020.
During the pandemic, insurers pocketed £3.3billion in plain sight from their customers who had had fewer accidents and drove fewer miles.
Insurers have kept shtum and, therefore, largely escaped scrutiny. But if the government is now looking for opportunities to give hard-pressed consumers a break, the insurance industry's £3.3billion pandemic super profits would be a big help.